


Build this City

by SelanPike



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Exile!Midnight Crew shenanigans, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-21
Updated: 2011-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-27 16:10:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SelanPike/pseuds/SelanPike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How many times does he have to tell you. He made this town.</p><p>Four exiled Dersites stumble upon a storehouse of carpenter droids while looking for provisions. One of them decides to put the droids to work.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Build this City

            It had become standard procedure to thoroughly investigate any shelter they found while wandering the desert. It made sense, after all. They were perpetually short on food and water and they needed to make sure they didn’t overlook anything.

            It was a hole in the ground. The ladder was still intact, and they climbed down into a dark underground chamber. It was mercifully cool down there, compared to the scorching desert up above. The path forked, so Hedgemonic Brute and Courtyard Droll took one path while Jack Noir and Draconian Dignitary took the other. The path was dark, but thankfully a few emergency lights were still working. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to make out where they were going.

            “Better be some fuckin’ food here,” Jack muttered as he stepped over some old cables.

            “Even if not, we’d do well to rest here until nightfall,” Dignitary said. “In this weather we should avoid traveling by day.”

            “Blah, blah, afraid the sun’ll ruin your complexion, I get it,” Jack stopped at a large computer console. “The fuck is this?”

            “Hell if I know,” Dignitary said as he inspected behind the computer, still miffed at Jack’s remark. “Boot it up and see if it does anything.”

            Jack kicked it a couple of times. This accomplished nothing. Dignitary rolled his eyes, looked the machine over, and pressed a button. The machine whirred for a moment before the screen came on, dimly illuminating the room. In the new light Dignitary noticed that the walls here were not plain, that they were lined with metal hatches. He looked on them with interest while Jack typed into the console.

            “Anything interesting?” Dignitary asked, looking over a sign on one of the hatches. The writing on it was too faded to read.

            “It’s all in fuckin’ Alternian,” Jack said.

            “You can read Alternian, can’t you?”

            “Yeah, but shit gives me a headache,” Jack typed some more. “Fuckin’ Trolls and their fuckin’ letters, why couldn’t they learn to write like normal people.”

            “Stop bitching.” Dignitary walked over. He read some of the words that were scrolling past. “Carpenter droids?”

            “Sounds familiar,” Jack mumbled. He glared at the screen for a second before slamming a hand onto the counter. “I remember! That kid told me about this shit. Fuckin’ droids built everything on this planet. The kids use these things when they’re little babies to make their houses.”

            “Looks like this is some sort of master control station,” Dignitary said.

            “Fuck yeah,” Jack typed some more. “Now we’re gettin’ somewhere.”

            The overhead lights snapped on. Some of them were broken and the light was still dim, but it was much easier to see. Dignitary noticed a door on the other side of the chamber. He looked in and found an old, disused bathroom. He tested the sink and found that the plumbing still worked.

            “Jack!” He yelled, unable to hide the excitement in his voice. “Jack, I found water!”

            Dignitary leaned over the sink and drank his fill. Eventually he noticed that Jack was still in the larger chamber, fiddling with the computer. A couple of the hatches had opened and there were two carpenter droids out on the floor, moving their mechanical arms up and down experimentally. Dignitary walked back over and sprayed Jack with some water left on his hands. “Jack, you idiot. There’s water over there, go have a drink.”

            “Gimme a second,” Jack said.

            The screen now showed some sort of imaging program. Jack was drawing a crude building into it. “What are you doing?”

            “Givin’ these lazy fucks somethin’ to do,” he said, jerking a thumb at the droids.

            “It can wait,” Dignitary said. “You need to drink something before you pass out.”

            “I’m nowhere near passin’ out, calm down,” the tremble in his hands said otherwise, but by now Dignitary knew better than to try and argue once Jack had his mind set on something.

            Dignitary watched as Jack added in details on his little building, occasionally giving him suggestions to make the thing more aesthetically pleasing and less sharp and jagged. Dignitary even took the mouse a couple of times to draw something in himself, if only to speed up the process since Jack was taking his sweet time with it. Eventually the two of them were pleased enough to send the design to the droids, who scurried to the back of the room, into a pair of hatches that were a different color than the others. There was a noise as they were, presumably, lifted up onto the surface. When that was done Dignitary grabbed Jack by the collar and forced him to the sink. Once he was done drinking and the both of them had filled their respective canteens, they headed out into the chamber again. Jack went straight back to the console.

            “Will you cut it out with that?” Dignitary groaned. “We need to find Brute and Droll and tell them where the water is.”

            “So do it already,” Jack said, earning a whack upside the head.

            “So you can get ambushed by some horrible monster while you’re too busy staring at that fucking screen to notice?” Dignitary grabbed his collar again and pulled him away, towards the entrance. “Never go anywhere alone, Jack, remember? That’s your rule.”

            “Fuck you,” Jack said. “This shit’s important.”

            “Making sure we stay alive’s important,” Dignitary said. “Everything else is secondary.”

            “We can’t fuckin’ keep wanderin’ like this forever,” Jack said, pulling out of Dignitary’s grasp but walking along with him all the same. “We got a whole army of little builder-bots, I say we use ‘em.”

            Dignitary thought it over. “Build an encampment?”

            “No. A whole fuckin’ city.”

            “You need people to have a city,” Dignitary said.

            “We’ll get people,” Jack said. “You saw well as I did how many people were gettin’ exiled everyday. ‘m sure not all of ‘em died. We just gotta make some sorta beacon, so they know where to go.”

            There really was no arguing with him like this. “Alright,” Dignitary said, slowly. “We’ll build a city. Then, what, you rule it? Jack Noir, king of Straggler City?”

            “Fuck no,” Jack stuck his tongue out in disgust. “Think I want anythin’ to do with bureaucracy or paperwork ever again? Even you’d get sick of that shit. We’ll rule from the shadows, Dignitary. Fuckin’ pullin’ the strings while we let some other saps do all the boring shit.”

            “Fine,” Dignitary said. “Fine, we’ll do that. But we can’t have any sort of settlement until we find a steady source of food.”

            “’m sure we can reprogram the droids to do some farmin’ or somethin’,” Jack said. “You can program shit, right?”

            “Not really.”

            “Maybe Droll can,” Jack said, rubbing at his chin. “I mean he does bombs and shit. Bombs are like computers, right?”

            “No, I don’t think they are.”

            “Whatever!” Jack threw his arms in the air. “We’ll figure something out! In the meantime Brute can just slaughter some hoofbeasts or some shit, we’ll eat that.”

            They could hear footsteps as they got back to the ladder. Brute came running, with Droll waddling behind him. The both of them had excited looks on their faces.

            “Boss! Boss,” Brute said, almost jumping with joy. “We found food. A whole storehouse of it!”

            “I think some of these are seeds!” Droll yelled, holding out a handful of what, yes, may have been seeds. “Maybe we can plant them!”

            Jack beamed at Dignitary, who pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. “Okay. Well. Brute, Droll, Jack’s decided we’re building a settlement.”

            “A _city._ ”

            “Right, yes. We’re building a city,” Dignitary corrected himself. “We found some carpenter droids down the hall there. And some water, not that anyone seems to care. Jack’s already sent a couple to build a test structure.”

            “Wow!” Droll clapped his hands, sending the seeds flying. “Will there be people? And a park? And ice cream shops?”

            “Damn straight there will be,” Jack said. “And a casino and bars. Lots of bars. Hell, we’ll even get a tailor for Dignitary here.”

            Dignitary felt a faint fluttering in his gut. God, he missed good clothing. “I dare not get my hopes up.”

            “Sounds a little fishy to me,” Brute said, crossing his arms. “But then, I didn’t think you could exile the Queen, and you sure as hell managed that.”

            “One thing you gotta learn is that nothin’ stops Jack Noir!” Jack paused, frowning. “No, no, fuck. Not Jack Noir.” His comrades looked at him in bemusement. “That’s… fuck, that’s the name _she_ gave me. I can’t fuckin… this is gonna be _my_ city, I can’t keep usin’ the same name.”

            He thought for a moment, pulling at his hood. Then he snapped his finger. “Got it. Slick.”

            Dignitary’s lip curled in disgust. The name of the Genesis Frog? Really? “Slick,” he repeated in disbelief.

            “Yeah. Spades Slick, that’s me.” He grinned madly, showing all of his razor-sharp teeth. He pointed to each of them in turn. “You’re Clubs Deuce, you can be Hearts Boxcars, and you… Diamonds. Diamonds somethin’.”

            “Droog,” Dignitary said. “Diamonds Droog.”

            “I like my new name!” Deuce chirped.

            “’salright,” Boxcars said. “But first I say we get to eatin’.”

            “I wholeheartedly agree with this proposition,” Droog said. He pointed down the hall leading to the droids. “Why don’t you two go rehydrate yourselves. Jack—sorry, _Slick_ and I will bring over some food.”

            “Yaaaaay, water!” Deuce cried as he ran down the hall. Boxcars followed him at a steadier pace.

            Droog and Slick started down the opposite hall, their mouths already salivating at the thought of all that food.

            “Once we’re done eatin’ we can get goin’ on plannin’ this city,” Slick said.

            “One thing at a time, J—Slick.”

            “Fuck that,” Slick said. “If I wanna get ahead of myself I’ll fuckin’ get ahead of myself.” He shot Droog a nasty look. “And you better get used to callin’ me Slick now. I don’t wanna hear my old name, got that?”

            “Got it,” Droog said. They got to the end of the hallway and found the storehouse of food—apparently the refrigeration never lost power, so most of it was still good. They picked up some burlap sacks from the ground and started filling them with whatever looked the least disgusting. They’d learned from the scraps they found elsewhere that Alternian food, while perfectly digestible, wasn’t the most palatable. Normally they didn’t have the luxury of being picky, but here with every kind of food imaginable at their fingertips…

            “You need to promise me you’ll eat before you sit down at that computer again,” Droog said as they exited the room, bags full of food.

            “Lay off, will ya?”

            “Someone’s got to make sure you take care of yourself,” Droog said. “Sure as hell isn’t going to be you.”

            “Jesus,” Slick grinned. “You sentimental asshole.”

            “You’re the one being sentimental,” Droog said, “Talking about cities and tailors and people who’ve probably all died off by now. I’m just being practical.”

            Slick grunted. As they walked past the ladder leading to the surface, he said, “So you like the tailor thing?”

            “Stop toying with my heart, Slick,” Droog said.

            Slick laughed, slapping Droog on the back. “You’ll see. Tailors and bankers and even fuckin’ ice cream men for Deuce. A whole city, and we’ll be in charge.”

            They came into the chamber to see Boxcars at the console and Deuce playing with one of the droids. Deuce perked up at the sight of them and ran over.

            “All right guys, eat up,” Slick said. “Ain’t no shortage no more, so no need to ration anythin’.”

            With a cheer, the four dug into their first proper meal in years. Once they’d eaten until they couldn’t eat anymore, the four circled around the console and planned their new city. As the sun went down in the desert above them, Deuce and Boxcars went to sleep.

            “Aren’t you going to sleep too?” Droog asked Slick, knowing the answer already.

            “Nah,” Slick said. “You go ahead.”

            Droog rolled his eyes and leaned against the console. After a minute Slick gave him a look.

            “Well?” he asked.

            “I’ll stay up with you,” Droog said. “Can’t let you fuck up our city.”

            Slick chuckled.

            The two of them stayed up most of the night, taking turns designing various buildings and arguing over tree placement and the importance of the city seeming “oppressing” as opposed to “metropolitan”. By the time they finally decided to rest, construction on the downtown district was already well under way.


End file.
